Ryan Gosling Is Going To The Moon (In A Movie, But Still)

Ryan Gosling spent most of 2016 dancing with Emma Stone and investigating a porno conspiracy with Russell Crowe, so the next logical step… [scribbles calculations on chalkboard, slides beans around on abacus]… is for him to travel into outer space. And it appears he will do just that. Gosling has signed on to star in First Man, a Neil Armstrong biopic from his La La Land director Damien Chazelle. Gosling’s director, I mean. Not Neil Armstrong’s. Neil Armstrong was not in La La Land.

As far as we know.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, the film will adapt the book First Man: A Life of Neil A. Armstrong by James Hansen, with a script by Oscar-winning Spotlight writer Josh Singer.

Armstrong was a hotshot Navy bombing pilot during World War II then a test pilot in the 1950 and 1960s. The movie will aim to tell the story of NASA’s mission to land a man on the moon, specifically the years 1961 to 1969, according to studio sources. The goal is to explore the sacrifices and the cost—on Armstrong and on the nation—of one of the most dangerous missions in history.

Hmm. A movie about the first moon landing, reuniting the wildly successful La La Land team of Gosling and Chazelle, and starring Gosling as Neil Armstrong. Seems to me that the next logical step here is to… [erases chalkboard, scribbles new calculations, steps back in shock]…

I read the book, love space history, love Neil Armstrong, and am deathly afraid of this because Neil Armstrong was very reserved and didn’t have much of a personality. He was an exceptional pilot and a hero of the highest order. But man, god bless the people making this.

I absolutely did and I thought it was a good movie. Gosling was very good in it. I really hope like I’m not sounding like an asshole here because trust me, I am a space history nut and anything remotely about space I love. If the movie was more focused on Armstrong and “the moon” then I’m all for it. But he really is vanilla and I don’t want him fictionalized to make him more compelling. He faced combat in Korea, was a test pilot, lost a child, almost died in the Gemini program and walked on the moon. But he was selected to be the first man on the moon because, unlike Aldrin, he was so vanilla and NASA knew he wouldn’t make the moon landing about himself. I don’t know. Fingers crossed and all.